BAZ BAMIGBOYE on Keira Knightley, Lara Pulver and much more

Honestly, I don't want to be a diva, I just want to grow old doing this wonderful job

Keira Knightley spends all her money on documentary and drama DVDs

Here's Keira Knightley being very unstar-like: wearing her own clothes, when we meet at a club in East London; the weather is dull and, strange to relate for the global box office draw, she's got no immediate work lined up.

But Keira - fresh from a holiday in Bali with her beau Rupert Friend - looks absolutely radiant, dressed simply in checked shirt, jeans and boots, and carting an enormous shoulder bag with tassles, buckles, bells and, for all I know, whistles.

Apart from the impending release of new film The Duchess, she is footloose and fancy-free. But she's not despondent.

'It's good to step back sometimes and live life.

'I mean, you don't have to have murdered to play a murderer, but it is important to experience a bit of real life if I'm going to be any good at what I do.

'I suppose I'm very aware that with the particular field of the industry I'm in, it isn't for ever,' she tells me.

But then she adds that she wants to grow old disgracefully and have a career that endures, like those of Judi Dench, Helen Mirren and Vanessa Redgrave.

It infuriates her that older women aren't appreciated in this country as they are in, say, France and Italy.

'I read articles sometimes and it's women tearing apart other women.

'You certainly don't see a picture of a man of 60 standing up there with another picture of how he looked at 20 with a caption saying: "Look what happened to him! Isn't he disgusting now?" ' she says, recalling an item savaging Faye Dunaway because she didn't look the same as she did 40 years ago, in Bonnie And Clyde.

'Yet we also find it disgusting that women have cosmetic surgery.

'You never quite know what you're meant to do. People age - that's what happens.

'I think it would be great to see more older actresses playing characters who are doing amazing things.

'It's boring to see movies featuring women in their 20s all the time - I don't just want to have a romantic, 20-year-old, silly girl in films all the time,' she says, laughing at herself as she says it.

In fact, Keira does play a young woman, though not a silly one - Regency beauty and socialite Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire - in Saul Dibbs's triumph The Duchess, a film I can see as an Oscar and Bafta contender on all fronts.

'Georgiana had no power whatsoever, but she managed to create herself as a force in politics,' she tells me.

Her own politics are her own business she says, smartly cutting me off before I venture in that direction, although she allows that she has been following the American presidential elections - Barack Obama in particular.

Her information on the subject comes from papers and books. She doesn't watch TV - although she admits to being hooked on the HBO series The Wire, which she's watching on DVD.

'That's where my money goes: documentary and drama DVDs. The books are for work and pleasure.

'I don't have any formal education so I've taken it upon myself to try and not be as ignorant as I was,' she says.

Where else does her money go?

'I spend it on very good food and I'm very fortunate to have a lot of flowers,' she says.

I wonder if she has the blooms flown in on a private jet from some exotic spot like one or two actresses I have known.

'Who does that? Do tell!

'I have one bouquet of flowers a week, which is a complete extravagance, from a florist down the street. It's nice to have flowers in the flat.

'My parents taught me the value of money. I don't take it for granted and, to tell you the truth, I don't have very expensive tastes.

She rubbishes reports that last year she pocketed $33 million. 'Wow, that would be nice! I'd have a very big house and I'd buy the dresses I borrow for the red carpet.

'I'm very lucky at the moment, but not that lucky.'

She admits that she could earn more if she made a constant stream of big-budget Hollywood fare like the Pirates films.

'But when you do films like The Edge Of Love and The Duchess there are no big pay days - you do them because you want to do the work, and to work with certain directors. My ambition isn't to buy loads of property.'

Anything tucked away is for her bus-pass years but, she adds: 'I want to be doing this when I'm old, without any fuss.'

How to be a really bad superhero

Hoping to fall flat: Andrew Johnson

It's not easy to pull the wool over Matthew Vaughn's eyes (or, in this case, his ears) but Aaron Johnson did just that - and won himself the lead role in the blockbuster movie version of Mark Millar's graphic comic book Kick-Ass.

Vaughn had instructed his casting director not to audition young British actors for the part of David Lizewski, a wannabe superhero who - Houston, we have a problem! - lacks super-powers.

'I was working in the U.S. anyway and did a screen test using an American accent and he didn't realise I was British. I kind of fooled him,' Aaron told me.

Vaughn backed up the story: 'I fell off my chair when I was told. His American accent is pitch perfect and he can bloody well act.'

Aaron recently appeared as Robbie 'the hottie' in Gurinder Chadha's movie Angus, Thongs And Perfect Snogging and at 18 has buckets of potential.

Indeed, when I was on the set of Angus... Ms Chadha declared that Aaron, from Buckinghamshire, but now residing in London, had star quality.

She was right: he does have a winning screen style about him.

On Tuesday, Aaron was having wardrobe tests out at Elstree film studios.

'Dave (Lizewski) is just an ordinary guy; he's not geeky, but he's not cool either.

'He gets his kicks dressing up in a makeshift super-hero outfit complete with Timberland boots.

'He goes out to try and find some crime to prevent and ends up getting the hell kicked out of him because, obviously, he's not a real super-hero.

'That's the thing about Kick-Ass,' Aaron explained. 'It's set in the real world and poor old Dave ends up in hospital.'

Director Vaughn has surrounded Aaron with Nicolas Cage, who is playing Big Daddy, as well as Chloe Moretz, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Mark Strong.

Shooting starts on September 6 in London, then moves to Toronto, before returning to this country for a further nine weeks of filming on the screenplay, penned by Vaughn and Jane Goldman.

It's the third script she's written with Vaughn. Next one is The Debt and negotiations have begun to - it is hoped - cast Helen Mirren in it.

Lara's set to turn heads among the Merrie Men of Sherwood Forest

Fight club: Lara Pulver has been on a fight training course

Lara Pulver has done everything from kicking her heels up to kicking butt on stage, and now she's about to kick some shins, among other things, on TV.

The actress has been through a fight training course (including how to handle a lion!) and swordplay for her role as Isabella, sister of Guy of Gisborne, in the third series of the BBC action drama Robin Hood, which has just started filming in Budapest.

Lara will emerge as the major female lead when Robin Hood screens in the New Year.

The Isabella role is no girlie damsel-in-distress sort of part.

She'll be called upon to make life extremely un-merrie for Robin and his men in green tights.

Lara, who won plaudits for her performance in the musical Parade at the Donmar last year, was also in A Chorus Line at the Sheffield Crucible and several other theatre productions, but I was surprised to learn Robin Hood marks her first TV drama.

She'll be on location in Hungary with stars Jonas Armstrong and Richard Armitage for several months.

All you need is Kate Winslet...

Kate Winslet: Will it come together?

Kate Winslet is one of several actresses the artist and celebrated film-maker Sam Taylor-Wood wants to meet on the long and winding road to finding someone to portray John Lennon's mother in a film about the music legend's early life.

Taylor-Wood, once shortlisted for the Turner art prize, will direct the picture on locations in and around Lennon's Liverpool birthplace.

Filming will begin in March on the poignant three-way tug of love between two of the most important women of his childhood: his mother Julia, who left him to a caring but strict upbringing by his Aunt Mimi, Julia's step-sister.

The film, written by Matt Greenhalgh who won a Bafta and an Evening Standard film award for his screenplay for the movie Control, will have as its backdrop a portrait of post-war Britain and will focus on the clashing siblings who, between them, produced the Beatles icon who, along with Paul McCartney, changed the face of music in this country.

Taylor-Wood's film will follow Lennon's story from the time his mother comes back into his life - he was 15 - and begins to influence his path with her love of music, leading him to form the Quarrymen with McCartney and George Harrison.

Casting hasn't actually started, but I understand that Winslet, who is heading for Oscar nominations for forthcoming films Revolutionary Road and The Reader, is someone the film-maker wants to discuss the picture with.

Emily Watson is another, possibly with a view to playing Aunt Mimi.

Auditions will begin in Liverpool next month to search for suitable teenagers to play The Beatles' legends Lennon and McCartney in their youth.

Ecosse Films is producing the film with Hanway productions and it's an inspired choice to contract Taylor-Wood to make the movie.

She knows her way around the music industry, having worked with Elton John and the Pet Shop Boys on various projects.

Plus, as producer Robert Bernstein, who is making the film with Douglas Rae of Ecosse, noted she has 'a vital visual intelligence' coupled with a strong sense of storytelling, which I observed when I saw her debut short film Love You More, featuring music by the Buzzcocks, at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

The film will boast a Fifties rock 'n' roll and blues soundtrack.

Also, entreaties will be made to Yoko Ono to seek permission to use appropriate Beatles and Lennon songs - such as Mother, for instance.

There has been a lot of interest in American rights from studios such as Miramax and Focus and the bidding will begin at the Toronto International Film Festival, which starts next Thursday.

Edith heads up west...

Elena Rodger, who gives a powerhouse performance in the Donmar Theatre production of Piaf (an exploration of the life of singer Edith Piaf), will lead the show into the West End when its run ends at the Donmar.

The play by Pam Gems, directed by Jamie Lloyd, will begin performances at the Vaudeville Theatre from October 21 for a limited 14-week run.

Ms Roger, an Argentine singer and actress who made her London debut in Evita, gives one of the year's best performances as Piaf and I liked that she brings a sense of cold reality to Piaf.

The movie's a glorious delight which had me doubling up with laughter with its wickedness.

It's not a line-for-line retread of the play - and thank God for that - because I don't think the 'Master' intended his works to be museum pieces.

Easy does it: Biel and Barnes

Elliott and his cast bring brio to the story of a high-living American gal with a past, (Ms Biel), who marries an upperclass twit (Barnes), who takes his bride to meet the parents and his two destructive sisters (priceless Kimberley Nixon and Katherine Parkinson) at their crumbling English pile.

'Get the Camelias out of the rain and put them by the front door before the guests arrive!' Scott Thomas's thin-lipped Mrs Whittaker barks at the gardener.

'Oh, by the way - smoking.

• Douglas Hodge and Denis Lawson (taking over from Philip Quast), who will lead the Menier Chocolate Factory Theatre production of La Cage Aux Folles into the Playhouse Theatre, London with performances beginning October 20.

The show, by Jerry Herman and Harvey Fierstein, features the popular standard I Am What I Am, among others, and will bring a touch of St Tropez to London this winter.

Terry Johnson is back directing with the same creative team, including Lynne Page as choreographer.

• Alison Steadman and David Troughton, who are in the Peter Hall Company's hit production of Alan Bennett's little-seen play Enjoy at the Theatre Royal, Bath until tomorrow.

The black comedy, directed by Christopher Luscombe, tours from next week at the Lowry in Salfrord, and ends its run in Richmond in November.

There's talk of producer Danny Moar moving it into the West End around Christmas.

Don't. It wilts the Azaleas,' she warns Biel's carefree Larita.

If you're a lover of chihuahuas, I'd advise you take smelling salts to the cinema.

You'll be upset although, to my shame, I laughed like a drain at this particular scene.

The film premieres at the Toronto International Film Festival and opens here on November 7, after a closing night slot at the Times BFI London Film Festival.